SOE News

Peabody Pulse

Thompson Dorsey article cited by N.Y. Times columnist

A journal article written by Assistant Professor Dana Thompson Dorsey was cited by New York Times columnist Charles Blow in a column about resegregation in schools and society. The column, published on Friday, mentions Thompson Dorsey and the article published in the journal Education and Urban Society. Thompson Dorsey's study found that students are more racially segregated in schools today than they were in the late 1960s. The Blow column is available here. Thompson Dorsey's article is available here.

Able project wins $1.2 million grant

The U.S. Office of Education has awarded a $1.2 million grant a project led by Harriet Able, Associate Professor of Early Childhood Intervention and Family Support, and two faculty members in UNC's Department of Allied Health Sciences: Elizabeth Crais and Grace Baranek. The project, entitled "Interdisciplinary Leadership in Autism Spectrum Disorders: Optimizing Research- Practitioner Partnerships for Evidence Based Outcomes" will use the grant funding to to fund doctoral students in Special Education and Allied Health for five years.

Cohen-Vogel and graduate students help launch school improvement project

Lora Cohen-Vogel, supported by six graduate research assistants, facilitated the start of an innovation piloting effort in three large, urban high schools this month. Working as part of the five-year, IES-funded National Center for Scaling Up Effective Schools, Cohen-Vogel's team worked hand-in-hand with teachers, school leaders and district administrators to develop an innovation targeted toward helping schools attend to students' academic, social, and emotional needs. The National Center staff will continue to work toward building their district partners' capacity to engage in continuous improvement, progress monitoring and - eventually - scale up as the schools implement their innovation with 9th grade students this year. The students taking part in the project are Chris Harrison, John Wachen, Danielle Allen, Ariel Tichnor-Wagner, Allison Rose Socol and Qi Xing.

SCALE wins $268,000 in grant funding

SCALE, the Student Coalition for Action in Literacy Education, has been notified that it has won more than $268,000 in grant funding. The Corporation for National and Community Service and the N.C. Commission on Volunteerism and Service for the AmeriCorps program, the N.C. LiteracyCorps, awarded a grant of $264,032. This marks the tenth consecutive year SCALE has secured this funding. SCALE also received $2,000 grants from Youth Service America to serve as a lead agency for Global Youth Service Day 2014 and from the Dollar General Literacy Foundation for SCALE's Social Justice Book Project in its America Reads program.

Doctoral student Amy Lerner wins dissertation award

Amy Lerner, a Ph.D. student in the Early Childhood, Intervention and Literacy program has been awarded the 2013 James. J. Gallagher Dissertation Award from the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute. Lerner will be presented the award at the FPG Annual Meeting on October 4. Lerner's dissertation is based on a project that was profiled by the University Gazette over the summer. The story is available here.

Doctoral student Melissa Sreckovic wins dissertation grant

The Organization for Autism Research has given a dissertation grant award to Ph.D. student Melissa Sreckovic for her dissertation entitled, "Introducting Students with High Functioning Autism to Peer Social Networks. The dissertation is under the direction of Harriet Able, associate professor of early childhood intervention and family support, and Kara Hume of the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute.

Judith Meece, professor of educational psychology, presided over the conference of Division 15 (Educational Psychology) at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association in Honolulu, Hawai'i. The conference featured for paper sessions, 80 posters, symposia, invited and award presentations, and mentoring activities for doctoral students and early career scholars. The program was co-chaired by Associate Professor Jeffrey Greene and School of Education alumnus Matthew Irvin of the University of South Carolina. For more information, see the APA Division 15 website.

GSA hosting football party Thursdsay

The Graduate Student Association will host a football viewing party on Thursday at 6 p.m. at Fitzgerald's, in the Cottage Room. Fitzgerald's is located at 206 West Franklin Street. Plan to go watch the Tar Heels play South Carolina. Appetizers will be provided. For more information, email Cheryl Varghese (cvarghes@live.unc.edu) or Danielle Allen (djallen@live.unc.edu).

SOE Brown Bag presentation dates set for Fall semester

This year's School of Education Brown Bag series kicks off with three sessions scheduled for the Fall semester. Associate Professor Jeff Greene will present a talk entitled "Learning Styles, Multiple Intelligences, and Multitasking: Persistent Myths and Misunderstandings in Education" on Sept. 18. Sam Odom of the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute will present an Oct. 23 talk entitled "An Implementation Science Approach to Professional Development in Autism Spectrum Disorders." Steve Knotek will present on Nov. 13. All SOE Brown Bags will be held at noon in Peabody 02. Light lunches will be provided for approximately 25 people at each of this year's Brown Bag Lunch talks. The lunches are made possible through the generous support of Malbert Smith (M.Ed. '77, Ph.D. '80) and Metametrics, Inc.

GSA hosting 'Survival Guide' session

The Graduate Student Association will host a brown bag talk entitled "Graduate Student Survival Guide" on Sept. 4 at 1 p.m. The location is yet to be determined.

FPG offering statistical methods workshop on Sept. 24

The Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute is holding a workshop for faculty, graduate students, researchers and others who want to learn more about statistical methods for analyzing longitudinal data. The workshop will be held Sept. 24 at the institute in the Sheryl-Mar South Building in Carrboro. For more information and to register, visit http://tinyurl.com/qfoe98w.

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